Stories and Mischief

I’m Taking Death and Suffering Personally

26Mar

Every death I hear about is now personally connected to me, whether or not it is actually someone I’m close to. I’m not arrogant enough to think I will maintain this level of sensitivity, but right now I embrace all hardship and suffering as an affront to my own person. And death and suffering are suddenly everywhere.

In the past six months…

A friend I had in college died, leaving behind a husband and two children. This was a healthy woman, a woman my age, a woman I had not talked to face to face in more than a decade. I felt her loss keenly.

My uncle is considering drastic steps to combat his multiple, complex health issues, and I count his suffering as one of my own.

My sister-in-law lost her grandmother, and I grieve almost as if it had been my own grandmother.

My grandfather passed away and even though he was 94, it was quick and unexpected.

And now, after a controversial decision and a drastic reversal by a hugely respected charity organization, the level of polarization within the Christian community was revealed.

What are these dark thoughts of inevitability, impending doom and constant bracing for the worst? What is it that makes my heart feel clenched and heavy?

My sister named what I could not: despair.

Isn’t that Melodramatic?

Despair sounds like a pretty drastic word. I think of it being used in a scene from Princess Bride when the albino henchman with the raspy voice starts telling the heroes their location: the Depths of Despair.

I used to be aware of danger, but didn’t bother with the possibility of it coming to me. We bought life insurance, but didn’t really discuss the possibility that one of us would actually DIE. It was all theoretical, and to dwell on it felt pessimistic (and honestly, it really didn’t occur to me to dwell on it anyway – it just wasn’t in my mind). There’s almost always something positive to find, even in the midst of hardships. Sometimes you have to zoom waaaay in to notice it, but the positive is in there somewhere.

Is this what was meant in Romans 12:15, “Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep”? Have I only chosen to listen to the latter all these years, ignoring the challenge to enter into weeping?

Weeping makes me all red, puffy and exhausted. It makes my throat hurt. I’m not a pretty or dainty weeper, and it might be paired with wailing when it happens. It is probably uncomfortable for any parties who witness the weeping, but I’m glad to say that it is only a small number of people who have been subjected to it. (I’m sure you’d be happy to have avoided it if you knew what it looked like.)

Other translations of the verse mentioned above use the word “mourn” and today I feel the burden of the world, and a sense of mourning.

Some may say that word too is dramatic, too extreme for the circumstances.

I disagree.

Mourning is just right.

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There are events so significant, their scope so broad in impact that mourning and despair are the only appropriate words.

Tonight, I am focused on the betrayal so many believers feel, on both sides of the issue. Some felt so betrayed by World Vision’s decision to allow gay married couples to be on staff that they withdrew their sponsorship and condemned both the decision and reiterated their abhorrence for homosexual people. People on the other side of the issue got their turn to feel betrayed when the organization reversed its decision, and asserted that they’d make sure their employees signed a document agreeing to a specific lifestyle code.

It feels like the final glove has been thrown down in the ongoing battle. Knives have been drawn in a fist fight. There is no room for middle ground anymore. How can either side try to meet in the middle and agree to disagree when the reactions have been so extreme? Such vehement spewing of un-love in the name of love makes me question if there can be – or should be – reconciliation after such a display. Where can we go from here?

Despair.

Fracture.

Heartache.

Sorrow.

Sorry I don’t have a tidy end to this post. I would ask that in discussing this, we all keep each other’s humanity at the forefront of our minds, and treat one another with utmost respect in any comments we offer, knowing that we come at this from very different angles.

I feel for the leadership at WV right now: they are operating from a place of fear and allowing that fear to drive their decision-making.
Both of these drastic decisions they made had no apparent connection to truth, conviction, or heart. Money was the weight on their pendulum; or rather the FEAR of money being lost. No leader wakes up and says, “what’s the most divisive pot we could publicly stir, because our funding is too great right now?” Certainly there was the fear of lawsuit and trouble on one side and the fear of pulled support and trouble on the other. WV farted in their car and forced everyone riding along to deal with it: some got out, some are holding their breath, but no one gets to breath clean and stay in the car.
Money and fear. No thank you.
Oh wait… Wasn’t there something about dying children in desperate places? Unfortunately they live in the middle of the pendulum swing, and for WV the quiet dead-center no longer exists and I FEAR it will become the place that WV swings through and throws some MONEY at on their way to defending themselves on the left or right or right or left.

I had a weeping morning yesterday, sparked by a photo in the current issue of National Geographic. A small boy with huge brown eyes and coal dust all over his tiny body was balancing a large piece of coal on his head as he stared into the photographer’s lens. He was working in an unsanctioned mine in India because people like me have an insatiable hunger for electricity. To make my life comfortable and clean. The weight of the brokenness in our world took my breath away and I wept. I felt like God and I were crying together, which helped but only a little.

T, you got it right. I feel like I live in a place where I am always waiting for the other shoe to drop. Despair is real. Marilla Cuthbert says that the “depths of despair mean the absence of hope.” (Anne of Green Gables) we have a hope that no one really wants to acknowledge because when you are in the midst of despair, it seems like a platitude. And yet, it is real. How do you tell a child, as Erica described, that “everything will be ok” and not sound contrite? How do we spew Bible verses at someone deep in loss, and not sound apathetic? I have no answers.

I have waited to post on this. So many thoughts and the first word that comes to mind is RAW! That’s how it feels when life is beating you up. I think there is a term we have been using a lot…” the feelings are close to the surface”. It like an open wound and every tragedy feels personal. The pain for others is amplified because it is tied up into your own pain. It doesn’t feel right. It is over-whelming ! I have even had moments where I was sure the world was coming to an end. And truthfully, times when I wish it was! I think what keeps us going is that a life without hope isn’t worth living. We have the hope of Christ return, of the resurrection, and the hope of justice one day restored. Whether it be politics, poverty, or the treat of loss of someone who does NOT deserve this! Life gets very heavy, but to live we must hope. To live we must believe that God is good, even in this. As must as I love my family, I KNOW God loves them more. So , I think we embrace the moments of joy, we hold them tight in our heart and we thank face each day looking for the JOY.
A few years ago someone gave me a card. I put it in a very place where I will see it every day. The caption is.. DONT LET ANYTHING STEAL YOUR JOY.
Choose to be well in every way. Choose to be happy no matter what. Decide that each day will be good just because your’re alive. Don’t let you thought and feelings color your situation blue or desperate. Even if you are in pain or in need, you can choose to be joyful. You are more than your body, more than you possessions. You are spirit . You have mind heart and soul and there is always something to be thankful for.

Thank you for your response. Raw is a good description. And I agree with so much of what you said. We can choose joy — something that is not dependent on circumstance or situation like happiness is, something deeper than “happy” usually is. Good, hard-earned words of wisdom, MJ. Love you!

There is a time for everything under heaven. I agree that happy and joy are not totally synonymous but there is a place fore grief. I hear Daniel praying for his people in the days of old ….. For me, in a grief long ago I wrote a poem that I read again as the chasm grows within the body of Christ that is the church beyond any denominational labels. Even as we choose joy, it is appropriate to also allow grief to teach us what we need to learn through this.

Come in, My Friend
4 November, 1993

Come in, Friend Grief,
You who are a messenger of God
What is it you want to teach me?
What is it I need to learn?

Hold me, dear friend,
Wash me in your loving tears
Don’t let me run away from you
I need the cleansing you bring.

My heart is pain within me
My body bowed with throbbing ache
I cannot hold you in, dear friend,
I have to let you go.

Forgive me, you world around
If for this moment I break the rules of decorum
My friend is here to visit me
And I must hear the message she brings.

Come in, Friend Grief,
You who are a messenger of God.
What is it you have to teach me today?
What is it I need to learn?